New releases from The Orb, Meredith Monk, and Marconi Union
Shaping up to greatness
Guillermo del Toro's surreal love story marks him out as a film-maker on the road to outstanding achievement, says MARIA DUARTE
RITA DI SANTO draws attention to a new film that features Ken Loach and Jeremy Corbyn, and their personal experience of media misrepresentation
JULIA TOPPIN recommends Patti Smith’s eloquent memoir that wrestles with the beauty and sorrow of a lifetime
MARJORIE MAYO welcomes an account of family life after Oscar Wilde, a cathartic exercise, written by his grandson
KEN COCKBURN guides us through a survey of Chekov’s early short fiction, and the groundwork it laid for his later masterpieces
ANDY HEDGECOCK revels in a hugely enjoyable but deadly serious examination of the 1930s, that is an indictment of our own era
The bard distills our hellish times into fiery words
The Shape of Water (15)
Directed by Guillermo del Toro
LITTLE could Guillermo del Toro's six-year-old self have imagined that his discovery of the Creature from the Black Lagoon and subsequent love of monsters would one day result in an Oscar-nominated cinematic wonder.
Creepy yet delightfully charming and touching, The Shape of Water is a spellbinding and visually arresting adult fairytale set in the US in 1962 against the backdrop of the cold war and it's on a par with his great works such as Pan's Labyrinth, Cronos and The Devil's Backbone.
Del Toro, who co-wrote and directed, combines the classic monster horror genre with film noir and encases it in a powerful love story with a musical number reminiscent of The Singing Detective thrown in.
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